Mello Sensei
by AkaiTsumi
Summary: Matt's struggling with science. Biology is baffling, chemistry is confunding and physics is just plain puzzling. There's only one person he can turn to for help...
1. Genes, Jeans and DNA

_AN: _I'm_ struggling with science. Revising for exams is a pain in the neck and I haven't got a clue what half the stuff I'm meant to know is. So, to motivate myself, I'm writing these: a load of stories where Mello explains to Matt various aspects of science. I don't really know how they're gonna turn out, but for now it seems to be working, seeing as I have to learn what I need to know before I can write Mello teaching it. And I like the idea of Mello being a good teacher. And also because it's 'educational' this is a good excuse to be writing stuff when I should be working. :D This first one was going to go into more detail, but it was taking too long, so I've split it into two chapters._

_Oh, and if there are any mistakes, please please please please _please_ correct me, otherwise I really am going to fail science._

_Other than that, hopefully, enjoy reading!  
_

* * *

**LESSON ONE: Genes, Jeans and DNA**

It was a quiet, dark night at Wammy's House.

Which in itself was a feat to be proud of.

The usual routine chaos that took the form of Mello and/or Matt torturing Near in as horrific a way as possible had been firmly prevented by Wammy and the threat of even more horrific punishments given their mountains of unfinished (or in Mello's case, completely untouched) homework.

If it had been Roger, they would have swayed at all, but Wammy . . . well, some people even Mello had to make exceptions for.

So as a result, the orphanage took a respite from the double M's mischief that night, whilst the two locked themselves into their bedroom and unwillingly attacked Mt. Homework.

Matt was struggling rather more than Mello appeared to be.

That was the thing about the blonde, Matt reflected as he flicked feverishly through his biology textbook whilst eyeing his Gameboy longingly. Being the rebellious ten-year-old that he was, Mello never actually worked in class even if he was begged by Roger on his knees. He might have done if the begging included chocolate, but Roger didn't understand the pros of bribery.

Matt pulled at the strap of his goggles in annoyance.

_He_ would never have been able to get away with mucking around in class 24/7 – his rank as third smartest kid at Wammy's was generally due to the hours of work he put in Amongst his hours of gaming, of course.

But Mello . . . Mello was naturally smart. He didn't need to pay attention in lessons, and still kept up his reputation as Number Two. In fact, the only time Matt ever saw him actually _work_ was when 'Near' and 'winning' were involved.

Or chocolate.

How he managed was a mystery to Matt. Perhaps he secretly _did_ study, late at night, whilst his partner-in-crime was busy snoring. Maybe he had a photographic memory to help him learn stuff quickly.

Whatever it was, Matt wished he had a key to Mello's genius brain more than anything.

Science was just too complicated . . .

After another minute watching words swim in front of his goggle-covered eyes, he gave up.

"Help," he turned to Mello bleakly.

Mello, too busy snapping squares of chocolate with his teeth whilst he stabbed at the keys of a graphic calculator, ignored him.

Matt counted to sixteen in his head, then tried again.

"Mellooooooooooo," he drew out his name in as pleading a voice as possible.

Mello didn't look up. "What?" he snapped, tone dark.

Matt pouted. "Can you help? Pleeeeeaase?"

With a dramatic sigh, Mello swivelled around his chair. "Help with what?"

"My biology homework."

Matt arched an eyebrow. "What is it?"

"Genes," Matt moaned, slamming his textbook shut for effect.

Mello's expression turned distasteful as he leaned back in his chair. "I hate jeans. I can't wait till I'm old enough to leave this dump and Roger doesn't have a fucking say anymore and I can finally buy some leather pants."

The corner of Matt's mouth twitched, but he tried to keep his face serious. "No, not _jeans_, dumbass, _genes_. Biology genes."

Mello smirked. "Same difference, asshole."

Matt felt like wringing his hands in despair, but then Mello would have called him a drama queen, which coming from the chocolate gremlin was just hypocritical.

Instead, as he didn't have time for arguments, he settled for rolling his eyes. "No, seriously. Please Mel – I neeeeeeeeed help."

Mello grimaced and slid his chair across the room to Matt's desk. "Okay, okay, if you quit calling me 'Mel'. And stop elongating words. Your whining is giving me a headache."

"Deal!" Matt beamed.

Mello heaved an enormous sigh and bit off another square of chocolate. "Okay," he said around the piece of heaven deliciously melting in his mouth. "What do you need to know?"

"Everything about genes," Matt answered promptly, leaning forward.

"Please tell me you know what a gene is?"

Matt creased his forehead. "Vaguely," he told him slowly. "I think I was busy getting eaten by the octopus-things in Near's Pacman game at the time . . ."

Mello stared at him.

Then he reached for a piece of paper and stole Matt's pen.

"I think we'll have to start from square one," he announced grimly, taking another moody bite of chocolate.

"Okay," Matt shuffled closer so he could see the paper clearly.

Mello drew a circle on the paper.

"This is a cell," he informed his goggled pupil, then paused. "You do know what a cell is, right?"

Matt threw him a look. "A cell is the smallest unit of an organism that is able to function independently." He recited, textbook-style.

"Right," Mello nodded. "And in the center of most cells there's a nucleus."

"Yup," Matt agreed. "I knew that."

Mello ignored him and drew a smaller circle inside the first one. "So this is the nucleus, okay?"

"What type of cell is that?" Matt asked, slightly off-topic.

Mello glared at him. "It doesn't matter. No, wait . . . it does . . ." he took another bite of chocolate. "To make things easier later, let's say it's any cell in the body apart from the gametes."

"What's a gamete?" Matt asked innocently.

"Sex cell."

"What's a - "

Mello chucked a pencil at him. "Matt," he interrupted in a growl. "Please. You cannot be as stupid as you look."

"What?" Matt widened his eyes behind the goggles. "I was asking a perfectly legitimate question. What is a - "

"Okay, okay, they're sperm and egg cells! Just do me a favour, shut up, and don't you _dare _ask the stupid question I know you're about to ask just to piss me off!"

Matt grinned. "What are . . ." he began but trailed off as the look on Mello's face told him he should start fearing for his life.

"We are _not_ turning this into a Sex Ed lesson!" the blonde hissed fiercely. "Now, d'you wanna learn about genes or not?"

"I do, I do!" Matt cried hastily. "Please continue, Mello-Sensei!"

Mello rolled his eyes.

"Now in the nucleus of each cell, there are a load of chromosomes," he drew a giant 'X' next to the cell and an arrow from it pointing to the nucleus.

"What's a chromosome?" Matt interrupted.

"Shut up. I'm getting there." Mello shoved the end of his chocolate bar into his mouth, crumpled up the wrapper and threw it at Matt's head. "Chromosomes are made up of strings of genes." Mello drew a load of scribbles coming off the chromosomes. "Those are meant to be the genes."

Matt peered closely at the paper. "Mels, your drawings suck. How can those be genes?"

"I thought you didn't know what a gene was," Mello snapped back agitatedly. "So how could you know?"

"I don't," Matt replied happily. "But if that's a gene, I gotta admit, I'm disappointed."

"You. Shut up. Now." Mello's voice was a deadly growl. "Or I'm stopping this helping-business before you have time to utter 'Mels' once more."

Matt zipped and locked his lips.

"Good," Mello turned back to his scribbles. "Now, genes are instructions. Each one determines a particular characteristic. Like your eye color or whatever. Got that?"

Matt nodded, but stuck his hand in the air.

"What?"

Matt unlocked and unzipped his lips. "How many chromosomes do you have?"

"In each cell? Forty-six. They come in twenty-three pairs – two versions of each chromosome."

"So where do you get your genes and chromosomes from?"

"Your parents. You get half from each – that's why they come in pairs."

"Okay," Matt said slowly.

"Can I continue? Or are you gonna ask another question?" Mello huffed. "And I need chocolate. Pass me a bar from my desk."

Matt hurried to comply, then waited as Mello tore at the wrapping and took a bite.

"Right," Mello said. "Now we get DNA. This is the chemical that makes up the genes. They carry the chemical code telling a cell how to work, and also the genetic code." From the end of the gene-scribbles, he drew the famous DNA double-helix.

"Oh!" Matt enthused. "I've seen that before! Linda was teaching Near how to make friendship bracelets in that shape!"

Mello face-palmed, then tried to be teacher-like.

"So, er . . . can you summarize what I've taught you?"

Matt pulled off his goggles, scrubbed them with his sleeve seriously, then put them back on again. "Yes sir! DNA is a spirally-shaped chemical-thing that tells cells how to work and makes up genes which are instructions to give you certain characteristics. Strings of these make chromosomes which are found in the nucleuses of each cell. In each nucleus there are twenty-three pairs of chromosomes, half from each parent! That's everything, right?" he rattled off in one breath.

"Er, yeah, something like that," Mello said weakly. "Only, it's 'nuclei' not 'nucleuses'."

"Oh yeah, I thought it sounded stupid," Matt nodded, then suddenly frowned. "Hang on, why did it matter that the cell you drew wasn't a – what did you call it? Ga . . ."

"Gamete? Coz gametes only have twenty-three chromosomes. Not forty-six."

"Why?"

Mello sighed. "Think, idiot. When do the twenty-three chromosomes from each parent mix in the first place? How d'you think they do?"

"Uh . . . _oh_!" Matt's eyes went very wide. "When - !"

"Yes," Mello leaned back in his chair, snapping off some chocolate with his fingers for once and dropping it into his mouth. "They're called 'sex cells' for a reason. They mix to form the twenty-three pairs and there you go. The recipe to make you, in one tiny, microscopic cell."

Matt nodded. "You know what? I think I understand all this now."

"Good," Mello groaned in relief and finished his chocolate. "I'm worn out. I'm gonna sleep. Don't disturb me."

"'Kay! I'll just finish the homework then!"

As the goggled maniac turned back to his work, Mello sighed, stripped, pulled on his pyjamas and collapsed on his bed. He had about five minutes of peace before a wail came from the other side of the room.

"Melloooooo!" Matt cried despairingly.

Mello's disgruntled "What?" came out muffled by the pillow.

"What's an allele?"

Mello moaned. "For chocolate's sake, Matt . . ."

"Please?"

"No, I'm sleeping," Mello grunted.

Then he relented. "I'll help you tomorrow."

"Yay!" Mello could practically feel Matt beaming. "Thank you, Mello-Sensei!"

"I almost preferred it when you called me 'Mel'," he muttered.


	2. Aleels and Aleleys

_AN: I tried to make this shorter. I think I've succeeded._

_Happy Belated Birthday L!_

_Huge thanks again for the encouraging reviews - and like before, if there are any mistakes, please let me know. I have an exam on this and more in two weeks. :( Less than two weeks! Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!  
_

_And by the way, Rain is an OC. But you could probably guess that. I hope we all know who Linda is. XD  
_

* * *

**LESSON TWO: Aleels and Aleleys**

Six-thirty:

Bright sunlight streamed through the tear in the curtains that had mysteriously appeared three years ago when Mello had thrown one of Near's robots at it in a tantrum. Matt stirred, rolled over and nearly fell out of his bunk bed.

"Gyrh!" he yelped wildly, clutching onto the side of the bed. In the bunk below, Mello mumbled something incoherently in his sleep.

Five minutes later, Matt gave up trying to sleep.

"Mello?" he called softly.

There was a muffled grunt.

"Can you teach me about alleles now? I have to finish my homework by this afternoon, and I can't sleep now anyway."

"No." Mello groaned. "I want to sleep even if you can't."

Matt huffed and tried again.

* * *

Seven-thirty:

Matt got bored of staring at the ceiling.

"Mello . . ."

"No."

Matt pouted.

* * *

Eight o'clock:

"Mello," Matt whined. "I'm so bored! Can you please get up?"

Mello swore under his breath. "Jesus, Matt, go for a run or something. Some people are trying to sleep here."

Matt sighed, but decided to go for a run anyway.

* * *

Nine o'clock:

Matt leapt onto Mello's bunk. "Mello pleeeease," he wailed, shaking the blonde's shoulders. "I've been awake for two and a half hours, went for a run, ate breakfast, got attacked by Rain chucking Linda's pencils at me and now I really really really need to know what alleles are!"

In ten minutes, Matt finally managed to drag Mello down to the kitchen and presented him with toast practically dripping with chocolate spread, a pen and paper.

Mello blinked, yawned and munched on his toast.

"Alleles," Matt prompted. Mello scowled.

"Well, first," he pointed the pen at Matt accusingly. "They're pronounced 'A-leels' not 'A-le-leys'."

"Oh," Matt was disappointed. "A-leels."

"Moving on," Mello said briskly. "Remember those chromosomes from yesterday? What were they made of?"

Matt gaped in surprise. "You mean, _you _don't know? But it's so easy -"

"No, idiot!" Mello threw the last of his toast at him. "I was trying to ask a question like the teachers do at school, to 'further your learning'. Obviously I know the answer."

Matt didn't really see the point in that, but decided not to continue the subject because Mello was almost crackling irritation, so he answered the question instead. "Chromosomes are made of strings of genes."

Mello nodded. "Alleles are just different types of the same gene."

"Huh?"  
Mello rolled his eyes. "You get types of genes, got that? Like a gene for your eye color or a gene for your hair color. Alleles would be a blue eye color or a brown eye color, or blonde or black hair and so on. Understand?"

"Different types of the same gene . . ." Matt repeated slowly.

"Now for each gene, you get one allele from each parent," Mello pulled the lid off the pen with his teeth. "So you could get the allele for brown eyes from one parent, and blue eyes from the other." On the paper he drew a capital letter 'B' and a small 'b', then pointed to them each in turn. "The big B is the allele for brown eyes and the little b is the allele for blue eyes."

Matt frowned. "Why?"

"It's just a way of representing them."

"But why is one a capital letter and not the other way around?"

Mello pulled at his hair in frustration. "You ask too many questions!"

"I'm just curious!" Matt protested.

"If you were a cat, you'd have lost all your nine lives years ago."

Matt grinned. "Nah, see, _stupidity_ killed the cat. Curiosity just got blamed."

"You blatantly ripped that off those copy-and-paste profile statements."

"Those fucking hilarious copy-and-paste profile statements."

Mello sighed. "I give up." He went to the fridge, took out the tub of chocolate spread and picked up a table knife, then sat back down at the table.

"Okay, basically," he opened the tub, "out of two alleles, there's always gonna be one that's the dominant."

"Dominant?"

"Yeah," Mello scraped a giant dollop of the chocolate spread onto his knife. "Even though you inherit two types of a gene, only one becomes expressed. The 'stronger' characteristic, or the dominant. That's the brown eye allele in this case."

"Right," Matt nodded.

"The 'weaker' characteristic's called the recessive gene, in case you're wondering," Mello added.

"That's the one that doesn't get expressed?"

"Yup," Mello stretched out his tongue and licked the chocolate spread from the knife. Matt stared.

"Won't you cut your tongue?"

"Nope," Mello winked. "I've got it down to a fine art."

Matt was impressed despite himself, but that faded instantly as Mello put the knife back in the tub to get some more. "Ugh! Now all your germs are gonna be there! That's gross!"

Mello shrugged. "Serves anyone right for eating my chocolate."

Matt shuddered, then pulled out his homework sheet. "Um, there's some technical terms and shit here I'm meant to know . . ." Mello plucked the sheet off the table.

"Hmm. First, 'genotype'. That's easy. The combination of the alleles from both parents, like here," Mello pointed back at the paper where he'd written 'Bb'. "Both of these together are the genotype."

"Okay," Matt said.

"Oh, and I forgot to mention earlier. Even though in this case you'll have brown eyes, coz the brown is dominant, you could still pass the blue gene onto your kids. You'd be a 'carrier' of the blue eyes."

Matt nodded. "Right. Got that."

"Next," Mello glanced at the sheet. "'Phenotype'. That's basically the characteristic that gets expressed in the end. So _your_ phenotype is blue eyes," Mello pointed at Matt's eyes. "Regardless of what other alleles you might be carrying. And mine is brown eyes, as is this imaginary person here." He tapped the paper.

"My phenotype is blue," Matt repeated, like it was a mantra.

"Next – 'homozygous' and 'heterozygous'," Mello frowned. "Okay. These concern the alleles in the genotype. If you have two that are the same, so like two blue eyes genes, that's homozygous. But if they're different, like blue and brown, then that's heterozygous."

Matt was looking confused, so Mello tried again.

"Say – just imagining, all right? Say that we went out -"

"But we go out all the time," Matt interrupted.

"No, like, like _dating_ going out. Because we're both guys, we'd be a homosexual couple, yeah?"

"Yeah," Matt agreed. This, he could follow.

"Well, when both alleles in the genotype are the same, they're homozygous. Get it?"

"Did I just hear that correctly?" A voice gasped from the kitchen door. "You're homosexual?"

Matt and Mello looked round sharply to see Linda and Rain standing there, eyes wide.

Linda shook her head. "No, we must've misheard them, Rain. No way would Matt be gay."

Mello jumped to his feet. "Hey, are you implying that I am?"

Rain laughed. "Well, you look enough like a girl; wouldn't take that long to start thinking like one would it?"

Mello hissed in annoyance, then turned maliciously back to Matt. "So anyway, if Rain or Linda, doesn't matter which, went out with _Near_, they'd be a heterosexual couple wouldn't they?"

Matt chuckled. "So if the alleles in the genotype are different, they're heterozygous, right?"

"Correct!" Mello beamed, amidst the gagging coming from the girls.

"Ew," Linda said, as Rain stole one of her pencils and flicked it at Mello. "Hey, will you stop doing that? The leads will break!"

Rain ignored her. "I think Mello and Near would be so much better as a couple," she taunted. "Imagine that! Oh, but when you get married, who'd be the bride?"

"Mello looks like the girl, but Near would be cuter in a wedding dress," Linda giggled, forgetting about her pencils.

"That's it!" Mello roared, picking up the chocolate-covered knife and leaping towards them. "I swear, I'm gonna kill you!" Linda and Rain screamed and laughed at the same time and ran out of the room with Mello chasing after them.

Matt frowned down at the pieces of paper on the kitchen table. "I don't get it. What happens when people have two different colored eyes?"

"That's genetic variation," came a new voice from the doorway. Matt looked up to find Near.

"What was that about me and Mello and wedding dresses?" he asked.


	3. Refraction and Light not Yagami

_AN: Hey, guess what? :D It's Christmas-special-time!_

_It's been a while, I know. I could bore you all with the full list of exams, 'controlled assessments' - new name for coursework, and more that I've had to do, but I won't. Instead, I'll say that I actually started writing this a couple of weeks ago (the twelfth to be exact) but only got as far as the first hundred words or so. I wanted to have this done in time for Christmas, but then realized this morning that Christmas was actually tomorrow. (It was a 'holy shit!' moment, specially as I hadn't done ANYONE cards, or wrapped up the presents yet - I had actually bought them though! - so I've been in a panicked rush all day. I still have one more to go. This is what I get for not helping my sister with the advent calendar this year I guess ...) So if this doesn't make sense properly, you have your reason!_

_Other than that, I've actually got a couple more chapters half written, so hopefully they'll be able to go up soon. I was gonna do a chapter on chemistry, but I turned 180 degrees, and have done a physics one instead. Enjoy!_

_And I hope all of you have an absolutely amazing Christmas and eat loads of awesome food and get everything you want! And also hope that none of you forgot about it like I did, or just left everything to the last minute. XD_

_Oh, and Meohy, I did my research! Wal-Marts _does_ exist in the UK, so we're not gonna need to jet over with your cardboard box with 'Wal-Mart' written on it. It's just called 'ASDA' instead. :P  
_

* * *

**LESSON THREE: Refraction and Light (definitely not Yagami)**

It was December.

Christmas was lingering just outside the door ready to tumble in on Wammy's house _any day now_, and Matt had put on his Thinking Cap. From now on, he'd declared, 'Inquisition' was going to be his middle name, and constantly asking questions was going to be his game.

Mello had raised an eyebrow at this and asked when Matt had ever _not_ constantly asked questions.

Matt had grinned evilly and announced that that would be nothing, absolutely _nothing_ compared to what was coming their way now.

Mello had gulped, and gone out immediately to buy an enormous supply of extra chocolate for reinforcements.

Now, armed with a monocle that he'd found on Wammy's desk to make him feel smarter, Matt was staring intently at a glass of water on the table in front of him.

"Hmm," he said, thoughtfully, then "Hmm" again, and then he reached across the table to where Linda had left one of her pencils lying around, picked it up and dropped it in the water.

"I thought so!" he beamed proudly, removing the monocle and replacing it with his goggles. "The question, though, is _why_ …"

"Why what?" asked Mello warily, despite knowing full-well that he shouldn't, as he entered the room.

"Mello!" Matt beamed, if possible, even more, as he spun around at the sound of the chocoholic's voice. "Just who I need!"

"Oh dear," Mello said under his breath.

"Look at this, Mels," Matt leapt up and dragged Mello over to the table.

"What? And stop calling me 'Mels'."

Matt pointed proudly at the glass of water. "Why does the water in this make the pencil look weird?"

Mello scowled. "Here we go again …"

"Please, Mello? I'll buy you all the chocolate bars in ASDA …"

Mello's eyes lit up. "Deal!" He sat down at the table. "So, why this pencil looks weird – you mean how the water makes the pencil look like it's in one place and then it seems to be in a completely different place when it's out the water?"

"Yes, yes," Matt said impatiently. "Well?"

"It's because of _refraction_," said Mello importantly.

"Refraction," Matt repeated eagerly.

"Yep," Mello stood up. "Well, I'll be off then. Roger wanted me to go to his office about half an hour ago."

"Hang on, w-w-w-wait! Mello! That doesn't help at all! I don't have the foggiest what this refraction is!"

Mello sighed. "Fine. Basically, it's light changing speed and direction as it enters a different density. Happy?"

Matt's mouth was hanging open. "Uh … in English, perhaps?"

"Oh my God," Mello hit his forehead lightly with his palm, then froze as an idea struck him. A slow grin spread across his face. "Excellent. Come on, Matt!" He grabbed him by the arm and pulled him out the room.

"Where are we going?" Matt inquired, mildly interested.

"I've just thought of the perfect excuse to raid Near's room. Now shut up and warn me if you see Roger anywhere."

* * *

Twenty minutes later and the white-haired genius' room had been completely turned into Destruction City.

"Look," Mello laughed. "He still has all these ducks he used to play with in the bath when he was like two!"

Matt's eyes widened behind the goggles. "Hey, don't diss those ducks – they're fricking awesome! Check it out -" he dived into the mound of discarded items behind him and pulled out a remote control.

"No way!" Even Mello was impressed. "They're remote-controlled ducks? Seriously?"

"Yup," Matt's face fell. "But we need a paddling pool or a bath or something for them to work."

"No matter," Mello shrugged. "I found what I was looking for." He held up one of Near's toy trucks – this one looked like a removal van.

"Why do you need a toy van when you're explaining about light and whatever this refraction is?" Matt was puzzled.

"For this," Mello reached into the nearest toy box and pulled out two pieces of road from a train-track set. He put them parallel with a gap about the length of his forearm in between.

"Huh?" Matt lay down on his stomach and propped his chin up on his hands.

"Just watch," Mello put the truck on the road piece at right-angles to the strip of carpet in between the two pieces. "You already know that light rays travel in straight lines, right?"

"Mm-hmm!" Matt nodded.

"Good. So this truck is a light ray travelling in a straight line at a very fast speed," Mello pushed the truck to the edge of the carpet. "Now, when it meets the carpet, it's a different density, so it slows down. But because it's perfectly at right-angles to the strip of carpet, it carries on in the same direction."

"Perpendicular," added Matt. "I learnt that in Maths."

"Yeah, whatever," Mello waved it away. "When it reaches the road again it speeds up and carries on." He pushed the truck slowly across the carpet, then onto the second piece of road and quickened its pace.

"However," he moved the truck back to its starting position. "When the light ray is _not_ travelling at right-angles – or _perpendicular_ as you said – watch."

He pushed the truck across the road diagonally to the carpet.

"One wheel hits the carpet and slows down," Mello pointed. "But the other one is still moving at the fast speed, so the truck turns." He demonstrated.

"Oh, okay," Matt considered it. "So because the first wheel isn't moving as fast it sort of stays in the same place, but the other wheel moving faster covers more ground and turns it?"

"Yeah," Mello pushed the truck through the carpet. "Now this time, when it hits the other side, because it's still at a slight diagonal, the first wheel hits the road first and speeds up -"

"- so turns it back to the original angle it was at!" Matt interrupted, clapping his hands.

"Exactly!" Mello agreed. "And that's why when you look through the water, the image looks out of place to outside the water. The light has entered a different density."  
"And what," thundered a voice from the doorway, "do you think you are doing?"

Both boys looked up to see Roger standing there.

"Is it just me," Matt murmured to Mello, "or does he look kinda pissed off about something?"

"Yeah, just a little bit," Mello just had time to whisper back before Roger exploded.

"You two! Can't you be left alone for _one hour_ without causing problems? It's Christmas, for L's sake! I've never seen Near's room in such a state, I've had Linda moaning to me about one of her pencils getting destroyed – something about them not supposed to get wet – and you," he took a huge breath as he glowered down at Mello and hissed. "_You_ were supposed to be in my office nearly an hour ago!"

"Oh," Mello said. "Yeah."

"I want this cleaned up now!" Roger ordered. "And then you, Matt, will go and apologize to Linda, and you, Mello, will be in my office faster than I can say 'You're in tsunami-sized trouble this time'." He spun around and stalked out the room, then stopped and shot over his shoulder. "And if it _does_ snow tomorrow, I don't care what you say, even if it is Christmas, you are _not _going outside to 'play'. I am not accepting the excuse that you just 'wanted to see if Near made a good snowman' ever again. Or that 'that heap of snow just _happened_ to fall on him'. _Understood_?"

"Scrooge," Mello spat as Roger disappeared, then snorted. "Like we're gonna pay attention to what he tells us not to do."

"Yeah," Matt nodded sagely. "And a merry Christmas to him too."


End file.
